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10 Findings That Contradict Medical Wisdom. Doctors, Take Note.

You might assume that standard medical advice was supported by mounds of scientific research. But researchers recently discovered that nearly 400 routine practices were flatly contradicted by studies published in leading journals.

“You come away with a sense of humility,” said Dr. Vinay Prasad of Oregon Health and Science University, who conceived of the study. “Very smart and well-intentioned people came to practice these things for many, many years. But they were wrong.”

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Some of those ideas have been firmly dislodged, but not all. Now Dr. Prasad and his colleagues are trying to learn how widespread are discredited practices and ideas.

这些理念中的一部分已被坚决摒弃，但不是全部。普拉萨德和他的同事目前正设法了解不可信的实践和理念有多普遍。

Here are 10 findings that contradict what were once widely held theories.

以下是10项与人们一度普遍持有的理论相悖的发现。

Peanut allergies occur whether or not a child is exposed to peanuts before age 3.

无论儿童是否在3岁前食用过花生，花生过敏问题都会发生。

Pediatricians have counseled parents to keep babies away from peanuts for the first three years of life. As it turns out, children exposed to peanuts before they were even 1 year old have no greater risk of peanut allergies.

At one point, the notion that fish fats prevented heart trouble did seem logical. People whose diets contain a lot of fatty fish seem to have a lower incidence of heart disease. Fatty fish contains omega-3 fatty acids. Omega-3 supplements lower levels of triglycerides, and high levels of triglycerides are linked to an increased risk of heart disease. Not to mention that omega-3 fatty acids seem to reduce inflammation, a key feature of heart attacks.

A lifelike doll carried around by teenage girls will not deter pregnancies.

少女背仿真娃娃不会防止怀孕。

These dolls wail and need to be “changed” and “cuddled.” The idea was that girls would learn how much work was involved in caring for an infant. But a randomized study found that girls who were told to carry around “infant simulators” actually were slightly more likely to become pregnant than girls who did not get the dolls.

The supplement, made from the leaves of ginkgo trees, was widely used in ancient Chinese medicine and still is promoted as a way to preserve memory. A large federal study, published in 2008, definitively showed the supplement is useless for this purpose. Yet ginkgo still pulls in $249 million in sales. Did people just not get the message?

Some men have low levels of testosterone and memory problems, and early studies had hinted that middle-aged men with higher testosterone levels seemed to have better preserved tissue in some parts of their brains. Older men with higher testosterone levels also seemed to do better on tests of mental functioning.

An estimated 460,000 patients in the United States get surgery each year to fix knee cartilage that tears, often because of osteoarthritis. The tear is painful, and many patients fear that if it is not surgically treated, the pain will linger.

美国每年估计有46万名患者通过手术修复常因骨关节炎撕裂的膝盖软骨。撕裂很疼痛，许多患者担心如不接受手术治疗，痛感会一直持续下去。

If a pregnant woman’s water breaks prematurely, the baby does not have to be delivered immediately.

如果孕妇的羊水提前破了，不需要非得立即分娩。

Sometimes, a few weeks before a woman’s due date, the membrane surrounding her fetus ruptures and amniotic fluid spills out. Obstetricians worried that bacteria could invade what had been a sterile environment around the fetus, causing infection. Better to deliver the baby immediately, doctors thought.

But a clinical trial found that if obstetricians carefully monitor the fetus while waiting for labor to begin naturally, the fetus is at no greater risk for infection. And newborns left to gestate were healthier, with less respiratory distress and a lower risk of death, than those who were delivered immediately after a break.

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儿科医生一直建议父母们不要让宝宝在3岁前食用花生。结果发现，即便1岁前食用过花生的儿童发生花生过敏的几率也并不会更大。

2019/10/05 01:38

Pediatricians have counseled parents to keep babies away from peanuts for the first three years of life. As it turns out, children exposed to peanuts before they were even 1 year old have no greater risk of peanut allergies.